The Discrepancy between Salaries and Wages
january 3 2010 at 1:22 p.m.
category:
During 2010, I hope to address more and more of your concerns about salaries and wages, give you some graphs and itemized location breakdowns for different regions, and simply, help you get more information. This first post of the new year will be one of many, more frequent, ones.
There has been a lot of talk about the accuracy of the terminology of wages and salaries, full time versus part time, contract versus staff. In this little post I'd like to alleviate some of this confusion. We manage a bunch of data, that runs the gamut through this, so it would be a good idea for everyone to be on the same page! All of these terms are used by production houses and studios around the world. Labor laws are often very different from country to country, so I will try and make it simple.
First, the terminology.
TIME:
Full-Time: An employee that works 40+ hours a week.
Part-Time: An employee that works less than that.
PAY:
Salary: A salaried artist will get an annual, daily, or weekly rate, and does not usually get OT pay. Overtime pay should be factored into the salary already.
Wage: Most artists are paid hourly with a 1.5x OT rate.
EMPLOYMENT TYPE:
Contract: Often don't get benefits, but this is changing. They will be hired for a show or shows, with distinct termination dates.
Staff: Do get benefits (vacation, 401k, etc). They are hired for the company, and will be retained through slow times.
Freelancers are another bunch altogether. A freelancer doesn't get benefits, often works from home, and may work on more than one show at a time. They will usually get a lump sum payment, or maybe a biweekly salary rate, where they will have pay taxes on later. If you are working for a studio IN HOUSE on THEIR EQUIPMENT, you are usually not a freelancer. However, often a freelancer will work a contract with a company. For this website, we categorize those freelancers with contracts as a contractor.
Freelancers make up their own rate based on experience, and quality and type of work, which can vary greatly. Because of this, we do not usually include their data.
Second, the combinations.
As you can see we have the three different categories, TIME, PAY, and EMPLOYMENT TYPE. We can mix and match the subcategories. Many companies do this. You will often find a Full-Time Staff employee that is paid hourly. But many full-time staff employees can get a salary as well. This is most common with supervisors and managers. Most artists fall into the categories of Full-Time Contract Employee. These artists are paid an hourly wage. Here's where it changes. Different countries have different labor laws, and so they can pay their employees differently. In the UK, the same full time contract employee will get paid a salaried rate, usually a per day or per week rate. Artists that agree to this type of payment should take into account any longer working hours that might be created, and should increase their rate accordingly.
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